@Riversider The BMW driving “middle class” is a very, very specific subset of people. I don’t know anyone who fits into this.
@bluebayou That number has me gasping.
Re: Eddie Lampert: I read the NYTimes article on him. Guy honestly sounds like someone without any context. Retail is just not finance, it is a different material, it doesn’t take a degree from Yale or the genius credentials you use to get there, to tell you that. It just doesn’t. Finance trades, retail sells, manufacturing makes. Why is Boeing facing the issues it has now? Financiers can’t run a manufacturing firm. Drrrrr. I’m sure Lampert is brilliant in some ways, so Yale took him, but did they make him into anything more? Unless he is intentionally driving the business into the ground, which is even worse, I don’t think they did.
One wonders if Lampert would have received better advice from old money. They might have had the wisdom to realize that reviving Sears would be nothing like finance.